Baka Osero Tachishoben
Baka Osero Tachishoben (バカ オセル タチショベン, literally "Stupid Othello: Pissing in the Street") was the first RPG by Lunatic Entertainment founder Thor Steinbach to begin actual coding development, dating back in 1999. Development Production for the game started in September 1999. Being produced at the very beginning of Steinbach's Internet usage (having started on June 22, 1999) and during the first days of his life as a sprite artist (likely started in August of that year), the game started out with terribly shoddy artwork done in MS Paint 98. When he realized this was insufficient, Thor switched to using slightly edited game sprites, primarily taking from Dragon Ball fighting games off the Super Nintendo Entertainment System as these were some of the only available sprite GIFs available at the time. Although the game continued having unique monsters drawn in MS Paint, this created a rift between art quality and ultimately this led to the use of altered monster sprites as well. Ultimately a Metroid (utilizing the Baby Metroid's huge sprite from the final chapter of Super Metroid) was used as a cameo enemy in the final stage, taking place on a space station. This quickly led to more monsters from other games getting cameo appearances in places, leading to the loss of all originality to the game and devolving it into essentially some form of fan game. Another problem the project encountered was the idea of Ascension, a form of limit break in which the characters, upon taking enough damage, are able to transform into mythical monsters that deal as well as take significantly more abuse. While each character was originally intended to transform into a different monster, Thor asked his friends what they wanted to transform into and they all unanimously wished to become dragons, with the exception of Melissa. A similar problem was faced in terms of weapons; each character was intended to use a different type of weapon. However, almost everybody wanted to use swords with Tanma, Melissa, and Alex being the only exceptions. In the end, these situations combined led to the project losing all appeal for its creator, who moved on to MUGEN and then later to create Sonic Bomberman, Have You Got The Balls?!, Kill Jeff!!, and Pong 2000. Unfortunately due to the long period of time since the game's production began, no physical artifacts of the game such as game code or artwork, is currently available and is considered to — at this time, at least — be entirely lost. Storyline The story followed a group of teenaged high school friends, with a focus on the characters Thor, Tanma, and Melissa. Although it initially started out as the shenanigans of this seemingly otherwise-regular group of teenagers, things quickly stacked up until epic, if ridiculous, events were unfolding. It was divided into 7 chapters, with the first chapter taking place in the city (retroactively Big City) and the final chapter taking place on a space station. Magical Elements Baka Osero Tachishoben introduced Lunatic Entertainment's common use of 12 elements. Each of these elements were used by a different playable character (although two of the characters were only in the party for a very short period of time). Each element also had 6 spells each. Each element is listed below, with the playable character who utilized it listed in parentheses afterwards. Characters Thor frame *'Generalized Class:' Paladin *'Elemental Affinity:' Lightning *'Ascension Form:' Dragon Thor is an over-dramatic individual who seeks to right the wrongs of the world; he is the type of person who considers themselves a "modern-day paladin", seeking to "fix women". Although his dream is to become the knight in shining armor, he seems to mostly fall short of this goal. Although good friends with the perverted photographer Tanma, Thor has recently begun to try and convince himself that he is not perverted like his friend, believing that this will somehow help him in finding the girl of his dreams. As such, status effects that would otherwise affect perverts will not affect him, leaving him to close his eyes and repeat to himself, "I am not a pervert." In the end, Thor chooses to sacrifice himself to save the world as the space station prepares to plummet to the Earth. Although he initially seeks to die alone in this regard, Melissa refuses to leave his side and the two perish together. Tanma frame *'Generalized Class:' Monk *'Elemental Affinity:' Fire *'Ascension Form:' Tanma is a pervert obsessed with women. He is a bit of an eccentric and carries around a camera to take pictures of girls, which doubles as his weapon in combat. His primary goal is to eventually get pictures of Melissa naked. He eventually gets his wish during the final scene in the game, when both Thor and Melissa sacrifice themselves to save the planet. During this process the two are transformed into pure energy Tanma's element is fire due to the fiery passion that rages within him — "Guts". Melissa frame *'Generalized Class:' Fighter *'Elemental Affinity:' Water *'Ascension Form:' Mermaid Melissa is the only female of the group, who is constantly hit on by Tanma and has a heated rivalry with Andrew for reasons that go unexplained. She is hinted at a crush on Thor, although it is never really touched upon. In the game's final chapter, the party makes their way to a space station but when it begins to reenter the Earth's atmosphere with the knowledge that its crash will decimate the planet's surface, Thor volunteers to sacrifice himself to save the world. Melissa, shocked and dismayed by this due to her feelings for him, chooses to stay behind as well as she is unwilling to continue living without him. Tad is disappointed that his friends will be dead in mere minutes flat, but being Tad he sees an opportunity when Thor and Melissa are transformed into pure energy. Seeing her nude form, albeit in the form of light, he snaps one final photograph before abandoning the station. Melissa and Thor's energies merge and the crisis is averted. Aaron *'Generalized Class:' Knight *'Elemental Affinity:' Light *'Ascension Form:' Crusader Aaron considers himself a knight in shining armor, although his dream is to one day work on games in the video game industry. He is one of only two characters in the game to start appearing after Chapter 1, as he starts out in college. He has a thing for Melissa though he is more subtle about it, and tries to impress her with his feats and deeds instead of simply acting perverted. Unlike the three primary protagonists and the two characters who die off, Aaron's storyline was particularly underdeveloped beyond his personal obsession with the group's only female character. In the final chapter, he is hurt when Melissa chooses to stay behind with Thor and sacrifice herself, but despite his protests he is unable to convince her to change her mind and glumly departs in the escape pod with the others. Alex *'Generalized Class:' Gunner *'Elemental Affinity:' Ice *'Ascension Form:' Mr. Carter Alex portrays himself as having a cool personality, wearing sunglasses at all times and wearing suits. He serves as the group's gunner, utilizing ridiculously large guns in battle. He is also Tanma's best friend. Unlike the three primary protagonists and the two characters who die off, Alex's storyline was particularly underdeveloped. His affinity to ice is intended to be a reference to his Mr. Carter persona (seen in-game as his Ascension Form), which is intended to be a cool yet "cold hearted" hitman or man-in-black. Andrew *'Generalized Class:' *'Elemental Affinity:' Psychic *'Ascension Form:' N/A Andrew is a member of the high school group, although he is not looked particularly highly upon due to his hatred over Melissa as shown when he slaps her in the middle of the first chapter. Despite this the party allows him to continue hanging out with them, but when crossing the street soon afterwards for another group hang-out session, he happens to be in the middle of the street when a semi truck speeds past, smashing into him and killing him. His lackey, James, mourns his death for mere moments afterwards while the rest of the party continues on. If he had any life left in him after this point, it was quickly snuffed out when the semi truck backed up again to see if he was alright and crushed him a second time while mortally wounded James, as well. Andrew does not reappear, although he is mentioned again later when James returns as the villainous Karkus. Jake *'Generalized Class:' Bounty Hunter *'Elemental Affinity:' Air *'Ascension Form:' Jake considers himself a bounty hunter, and while he is initially away at college he returns in order to hunt several bounties in the area. He is one of only two characters in the game to start appearing after Chapter 1, alongside Aaron, who is also away at college. Unlike the three primary protagonists and the two characters who die off, Jakes's storyline was particularly underdeveloped beyond his personal obsession with the group's only female character. At the end of Chapter 6, Jake succeeds in collecting all of the bounties in the state and is therefore officially done aiding the party. However by this point he has come to enjoy being back and so makes up a fake wanted poster for who turns out to be the game's final boss using crayons and glitter. His affinity for air is intended to be an in-joke referencing his being the tallest member of the group. James *'Generalized Class:' N/A *'Elemental Affinity:' Dark *'Ascension Form:' Golem (hinted at in both Karkus form and with Earwax Golem) James is Andrew's lackey, referred to as his "lap dog" as he follows him around like a lost puppy. Early on in the game the entire party gets together to go to Tanma's for a group hang-out session, but while crossing the street Andrew is run over by a semi truck. While James mourns the loss of his master the rest of the party shrugs and continues on, leaving James to also get run over as the slowly semi truck backs up over him. He reappears later on in the story. While Andrew was killed, it is revealed that James lived long enough to be upgraded with heavy cybernetic enhancements, coming to refer to himself simply as "Karkus" (a pun on the word "carcass"). He blames the group for leaving Andrew to die and attacks them as a boss battle, but is eventually defeated. Unable to continue the fight he uses the last of his remaining strength to summon a vicious Earwax Elemental from his ears, forming two pillars on each side of him that then proceeds to crush him, finally killing him and forming the monster's final form. This creature is also eventually defeated and does not return. Jeff *'Generalized Class:' Hacker *'Elemental Affinity:' Nature *'Ascension Form:' Jeff is the epitome of nerd. His comments are usually very long and technical, and often he annoys the rest of the group with one part of his personality or another. He is considered highly unclean and cannot stop talking about things that have nothing to do with the task at hand (or for that matter, the game whatsoever). In Chapter 7, he accompanies the rest of the party to the space station, but when it begins to plummet to Earth after the demise of the final boss, he reveals that he knows how to fix its orbit. However, he continues to state technological jargon that nobody else can understand and refuses to do any work on the space station until he has finished his explanation of what needs to be done. The group realize they do not have the time available to let him continue his speech and this leads to both Thor and Melissa choosing to stay behind and sacrifice themselves instead. Jeff doesn't join the rest of the group in the escape pod as he hasn't yet finished his explanation, and is killed in the following events when the station depressurizes. Despite this, the final scene in the game shows several jeffling "sprouts" popping up in various locations that the party had previously passed through, indicating that there are now more Jeffs than there were before. Jeff's affinity for nature is an in-joke about his ability to create fungal "jefflings" from spores shed from his body, a running joke of the real life high school group at the time (this also would appear as the primary plot for the later Lunatic Entertainment game, Kill Jeff!!. John *'Generalized Class:' Mechanic *'Elemental Affinity:' Earth *'Ascension Form:' John was the most underdeveloped character in the game. In the final chapter, when the party learns that the space station is reentering the Earth's atmosphere John is the first to take a look at the machinery components to try and alleviate the problem, but soon realizes that the station's tech is well above his pay grade. Jeff then steps in to try and educate John (and by extension, everyone else) on how the machinery functions, but takes far too long and is unwilling to shorten his explanation. As nobody else knows how to solve the issue, Thor steps in and volunteers to sacrifice himself to save everyone on the planet below. Melissa also steps in and offers to sacrifice herself as well. As John is not able to help them out with this, he leaves with the rest of the party to enter the escape pod and return to the planet but finds the door jammed. Although some of the party begin to worry, John uses his "mechanical expertise" to pry the door open using an item he finds lying around. Ultimately however while the crew escape, the item he removed to open the hatch was necessary in keeping the space station pressurized. This inadvertently leads to Jeff's death, as he has remained on the station to finish his long-winded explanation. Sylvio *'Generalized Class:' Thief *'Elemental Affinity:' Gravity *'Ascension Form:' Sylvio is the group's resident thief, although he detests the jokes about this the group often throw in his direction. His selfish nature also leaves him to consider his association with women more important than his alliance to the group itself. Despite this, his loyalty is never really called into question although he disappears on more than one occasion to chase girls instead of save the world. He also notably does not find Melissa attractive, unlike most of the group's males. Unlike the three primary protagonists and the two characters who die off, Sylvio's storyline was particularly underdeveloped. During Chapter 7, he locates and steals a station captain suit from the space station, and plans to use it to get "all the ladies", as ladies love an astronaut. His affinity for gravity is intended to be an in-joke to his thief class, as items "gravitate" towards him. Influence Despite Thor's fondness for the ridiculous title and overall premise for the game, it was long-forgotten, with the pieces remembered about the game eventually being reshuffled into GODex and the basic ideas of random ridiculous becoming a basis later on in both Troublesome Dicks and Teatime for Transients. It was remembered again in mid-November 2015 when a CD with files from 2001-2003 were discovered. Baka Osero Tachishoben is considered one of the grandfather of Lunatic Entertainment's Jaedonism lore. Although it has little to nothing to do with this fantasy lore setting and despite Sal'jaedon's character being created 4 years prior in 1995, the 12 Elements that form the very basis of the realms was developed for BOT. This makes it similar to Legend of the Dragoon, an early conceptual RPG created on paper in 1995, which started the "mythical ascension" idea that held a minor usage in the fantasy realms of Jaedonism. Although the two have long since became very separate designs, the character Karkus also served as the origin for evil Loranche businessman Louhen Rehale, who initially took over the role of odd-yet-far-from-villainous character transformed into evil cyborg, Karkus. As of December 2, 2015, the game has been considered to be revisited as Baka Geemu Tachishoben, a sequel featuring the same characters but now as adults, though it will ignore the ideas of Thor being deceased. Enemies In Baka Osero Tachishoben, enemies could be seen on the adventure map before being fought in battle. Coming into contact with them initiated the actual combat sequence. Category:Somarinoa's Content Category:Games Category:Original Games Category:Fan Games Category:Role-Playing Games Category:2D Games Category:PC Games Category:Game Boy Color Games